


Douse the Flames

by gladdecease



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Gen, Ghosts, Revenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-19
Updated: 2012-07-19
Packaged: 2017-11-10 06:37:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/463307
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gladdecease/pseuds/gladdecease
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Hale house has been the stuff of ghost stories since two thirds of it burned to the ground, but it's not the first ghost story Beacon Hills has ever had.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Douse the Flames

The Hale house has been the stuff of ghost stories since two thirds of it burned to the ground. Jackson spent more than one summer night camped out inside what's left, torn between excitement and terror as he waited for the ghosts to appear. Everybody did it; it was practically a rite of passage in Beacon Hills for teenagers to go out into the woods and spend a night in the burned out husk of a house. Some of them came back whispering of screams coming from underneath the floorboards, of the smell of smoke in the air, of being too hot to get to sleep even though the night air outside had dropped to below fifty. Some even said they saw the ghosts of the Hale family, begging them for help, or demanding that they burn too.

Jackson never saw anything, and never claimed to, but the ghosts of the Hale house have him burning now.

He runs as fast as he can, not knowing or caring where he's going. The bite is a red-hot hole in his side, making him gasp helplessly for air, for water, for something to cool him down. He _needs_ to cool down, needs to drown this fire that's spreading through him, scorching and toxic and far, far too much to bear. He reaches a cliffface and, seeing the twinkle of moonlight reflecting off water below, dives.

This is a mistake.

Beacon Hills is generally a small, quiet town, with enough industry to make it functionally independent from nearby cities but with not enough economic growth to attract too much attention from outsiders. The community keeps to itself, with few new members to shake things up; it's the kind of town where everybody really _does_ know your name. But that doesn't mean Beacon Hills is without its tragedies. The Hale fire (and the recent resultant killings) is merely the most recent, novel one.

Before there was an abandoned house to set their ghost stories, the children of Beacon Hills told stories about the lake out in the woods, where nearly ten years ago the bodies of three teenagers were found, waterlogged and bloated, with no idea of how they'd gotten there. The deaths were declared a horrific accident - a summertime adventure gone wrong - but that didn't stop people from speculating. Speculation turned to rumors, and the rumors, overheard by children too young to fully understand, became ghost stories. Whole groups of kids would go out to the woods in search of the lake, where they would daringly swim out, pretend to be drowning to scare their friends, and tell each other stories about what had _really_ drowned those teenagers as they dried off by a fire.

None of their stories were true, of course, all of them about creatures lurking in the depths of the lake: Beacon Hills' own Loch Ness monster! Careful you don't swim too far out, don't swim too far down, or it'll get you too! The children cackled, building up legends about this murderous beast, when the true murderous beasts lived among them. A group of scared teenagers, who'd done wrong and killed to hide it, made a pact of secrecy that cemented their guilt. And the only ones who knew were the ones who had formed the pact... and three others.

Their bodies had been removed from the lake, but their spirits were not, and they remembered.

They knew.

And they waited.

Jackson diving into that cool, inviting lake is a mistake for him, for his free will and agency, but it's just what they have been waiting for. And so they creep up inside him, through the still bleeding wound of the bite, and slowly, quietly make a home in his chest, twisting what he was becoming into what they need him to be. Vengeance makes them strong, and so makes _him_ strong, and isn't that all he wanted? It's only fair that they get what _they_ want too, isn't it?

As for Harris, he signed no pact of silence; he merely suspected. The guilt he feels is enough to get them a partner in their mission, however reluctant both he and they are to have him. They won't need him for long, though. Their control over Jackson grows stronger by the day, more complete. Soon they'll be able to finish their task, and finally be satisfied.

Soon, they'll be allowed to rest.

And Jackson? He'll be allowed to burn, the way he was before they found him. Maybe he'll survive the bite this time, maybe not. It makes no difference to them.

All they require is vengeance.

**Author's Note:**

> A theory about the kanima that smacked me across the head and demanded to be written out. I'm not so good with meta writing, so fic it is.


End file.
